a path to healing and wholeness

Pat Rullo, the awesome host of this radio show, kindly invited me on her show for two episodes, one talking about autoimmunity, and the other going deep into how to take back power over your wellbeing. Speak Up and Stay Alive is heard on radio stations all over the country, and is available on iHeart radio, the Tune In App, and Speak Up Talk Radio, among other internet stations.

To listen to the show for the 18th, you can go to the full show on youtube, or just listen to the interview with me here.

October 17: Dr. Lagrasso Beauty and Wellness Show

I’m also a guest on the Dr. Lagrasso Beauty and Wellness show October 17, which you can hear live at latalkradio.com at 7pmPT, or listen to the archived show here.

I have been remiss posting here, since I’ve been so busy with my exciting new podcast, Autoimmune Adventures!

As the name implies, the podcast is dedicated to helping people with autoimmune disorders reclaim their health and their life. The mission is to share cutting edge information and tools for people living with chronic illness and to create a community of support. Episodes will inspire you to say yes to the call to adventure of an autoimmune diagnosis, motivate you to take action to improve your wellness, encourage you on your path, and empower you to recognize the truth of who you are. Topics and themes include healing as a transformative journey, living well with autoimmunity, taking back your power, healing separation from self, healthcare approaches to autoimmune disorders, recreating balance in your life and immune system, nutrition and diet, self-care and stress reduction, and emotional and mental approaches to healing.

In the last four months, I’ve created 21 episodes, with a range of topics and guests. Some episodes are “content” episodes, in which I cover a topic. So far, here is a list of the topics:

Other episodes feature a guest. I’m finding people who I believe can bring quality information and tools that will aid those of us living with chronic illnesses in our healing journey. So far, here are the topics and guests with whom I have had interesting and fulfilling conversations:

As you can tell, nearly all of the topics are applicable to anyone living with a chronic illness, and many share valuable information even if you are healthy. So come join us on the adventure! To make sure you get updates as well as free gifts from myself and podcast guests, just sign up here.

I’m pleased to announce that I’m participating, with a select group of colleagues, in The Wisdom Giveaway. We are all coaches and practitioners of various sorts who are dedicated to not only share our own wisdom but to bring out the wisdom in others and help people live the lives they were meant to live.

I’m so excited to offer my ebook Be Successful Change. In this free resource, you will…

I love my March theme!! Most of the practices felt really good to do, and the universe provided even more opportunity to live this theme than I had planned. More on that in a moment.

Photo: Temari 09 on Flickr

First, reflections on a couple of the practices. I really enjoyed asking, “How am I showing up?” At first I had thought of this exclusively for when I was interacting with others through work, but I soon realized that I could also ask how I was showing up in anything, and even how I was showing up for myself. Such a useful question. It helped me come back to presence before or during a call, and at least acknowledge to myself where I was, hopefully without judgment.

I also found the practice of choosing to do something and connecting with why I was doing it in the moment to be powerful. Thanks to Kendra’s comment on my previous post, that practice too expanded beyond what I had originally thought. I still struggled with it, especially as I was working on my taxes, which always brings up a fair amount of panic. For days I wondered what possible in-the-moment ‘why’ would support me to feel better about doing my taxes. What came to me, eventually, was that I wanted to be in reality around money and my finances. Doing my taxes did not become enjoyable, however, it helped me feel like I was in more control and taking care of myself.

Asking what would nourish me and checking in with heartspace and gutspace regularly both felt like supportive self-care tools that I want to continue.

The unexpected part of this theme came from a workshop I did the last three days of the month. I have been very drawn lately to ThetaHealing®, and I had a couple of sessions with an experienced practitioner and then did the basic training. The days immediately after the workshop I was aware of a greater sense of fullness in my body—I felt more embodied.

Since March felt way too short, as did February, I’m thinking that a month may not be enough for me to dive into a theme as much as I would like. While I consider what I want to do about that, I decided that April would be a month of revisiting those practices from these first three months that I want to continue focusing on.

My theme for this month is to engage practices that support me to embody spirit as fully as I can. Since I want to start from the truth of what is when thinking about my themes, I have a confession.

The truth is, much of my life I haven’t wanted to be embodied. Since being diagnosed with asthma as a toddler, being a body seemed problematic. Mind was a rich and wonderful place to roam; body was a necessity to be hyper vigilant about controlling, lest I end up unable to breathe or find something new going wrong. I thought my mind was on my side, whereas my body was likely to betray me, as it seemed to when I developed an autoimmune disease.

The result was that I ignored a lot of my body’s needs—still do, even after all I’ve done to increase my self-care. I’ve improved dramatically, but still see ways that I treat my body more like an annoyance than a loved and cherished being.

My year theme is inspiration, and as I considered the question “What inspires me about embodying spirit?” I was immediately struck with the tie between these themes and my health issues. One of the meanings of “inspire” is to affect by divine influence, and another is to inhale. Older meanings of the word include “to breathe on” and “to breathe life into.” Experiencing lifelong problems with breathing, perhaps it’s no wonder embodying spirit was also a problem.

Embodying spirit to me means living more fully, allowing as much of spirit to come into this body and world as I can, and to fully live out the purpose of being me. This inspires me. So does seeing how fully I can receive what is already here for me, to be nourished by movement, the sun, the food I eat, breath, touch, sound, beauty. I want to continue to increase my capacity to listen for what my body needs and consider how its needs directly relate to bringing spirit/soul more fully into the world.

Ultimately, it comes down to love. (Doesn’t everything?) Can I learn to love myself, including my body, unconditionally? Can I love my body through my frustration at food allergies and not being able to eat what I want? Through times I have difficulty breathing? Through the process of aging? Even though I don’t have hair? Can I love my body regardless of whether I get healthier or sicker? Can I end the basic separation inherent in these questions?

My practices for this month:

Checking in regularly with heartspace/gutspace

Letting go of attachment to experience

Choose to do things and connect with why I’m doing them in the present (as opposed to future feedback, result, or outcome)

February went way too quickly – and now half of March is gone too! My theme for February proved to be a little more challenging than the one in January; I had more open spaces in my tracking sheet than I’d like. A lesson in choosing the practices, I think.

A few practices were difficult to track whether I’d done them that day or not. I liked the idea of tracking my action taking schematic, but it hardly ever happened, I think it’s easier for larger tasks, not so much daily actions. I didn’t remember to send out care with online interactions very often since I didn’t find a way to remember it in the moment. Two other practices, noticing judgments and enoughness were not tied specifically to anything, so they didn’t tend to come up unless I happened to be looking at my sheet at that moment.

Still, I feel good about mindfulness overall. I think I did grow in my awareness of how I’m feeling in the moment, of noticing things more quickly, of bringing myself back to presence. I didn’t think of including a practice around breath, but was doing it anyway—taking deeper breaths in the midst of work and otherwise. Such a simple thing, but it reminds me to let go of whatever has captured me at the moment and be aware of the larger now. My focus during my meditation and small breaks throughout the day on allowing, receiving, and relaxing is slowly creeping into the times I’m not meditating or taking a break.

Of course, mindfulness is a lifelong growth process and won’t end now that it’s March and I am on to a new theme!

My theme for February is mindfulness. I chose it because again it’s already something I was working on, and when I read my list of possibilities, it jumped out at me. It also feels foundational, as did my January theme.

Inspiration and Mindfulness

Since my year theme is inspiration, I ask each month what inspires me about that theme, with an eye toward what inspires me in the present moment, not as a potential for the future. I feel inspired about bringing myself more fully into the present moment as a way to bring myself more fully into the world. If now is truly the only “place” we can be, then really being “here” might be a good idea, instead of being somewhere else—past, future, fantasy, intellect. I’m also inspired by the idea of being more in harmony, starting with myself, and moving outward. I ask myself, “How much can I open to fully receiving what is here right now? Can I allow what is in this moment to be and to flow, as all energy wants to flow?”

I can see benefit to bringing mindfulness to many areas of my life:

Emotion and thoughts

My body – paying attention and giving it what it needs

Interactions with others on- and off-line

Where I try to numb, go away, escape

Where I am judging myself or my life

Taking action

Openness and receptivity

Scarcity/enoughness

My daily practices for this month:

Notice judgments

Practice receiving receptivity

Send at least 2 online interactions out with care

Notice 1 aspect of doing schematic around one action (I’ll blog on this soon)

Notice enoughness

Check in with last month’s practices

What are you practicing this month to shift your habits and achieve your goals?